Smokes and Skittles
by The Petulant Prodigy
Summary: "God never said the Apocalypse would be boring." In which Glenn runs into and befriends a survivor on a scouting mission, Daryl finds himself sexually frustrated, and nobody in camp knows what to make of The New Guy. Chaos, humor, and hormones ensue. M/M slash. Glenn/Daryl. Warnings posted inside.
1. Chapter 1

**Warnings: language, violence, drugs, male/male smut, show spoilers/deviations from original show plot, and an original male character.**

**A/N: When I started watching the show, I wondered how queer survivors, myself included, would deal with the new world: obviously can't be easy, seeing as the heterosexual relationships are a tangled mess, so I wanted to take a shot with a proclaimed gay character, so I had to create an original character. More than likely this story will contain Glenn/OMC/Daryl because this is fanfiction and I can and I want a challenge.**

**Oh, and quite a bit of character bashing across the board. You don't have to agree with me.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything/anyone except Jude and his charisma ;)**

* * *

**Part 1 rated 18+ for sexual activity between males, drug use, and potty mouths.**

* * *

**Smokes and Skittles**

**Part 1.**

_"All God does is watch us and kill us when we get boring. We must never, ever be boring."_

_–Chuck Palahniuk_

* * *

To be honest, the last place Glenn ever expected to find a fellow survivor during a zombie apocalypse was in the storage room of a sex shop.

Glenn had been slowly working his way through the small-town strip plaza for almost three days now just for something to do, not that he had found much, but it was still better than sitting back at the farm avoiding Maggie's goo-goo eyes. Miss Kitty's Lingerie was the last store in the dilapidated plaza and, unsurprisingly, had looked relatively untouched, the glass in the front window still intact, the garish pink door still secure.

Glenn couldn't help but smirk: when the world went to hell in a hand-basket, people had scrambled for food and weapons, not candy bras and strap-ons. Thinking about it, it was probably one of the safest buildings in the United States unless the zombies got desperate and started craving plastic, latex, and strawberry flavored lube.

He'd jimmied the lock. Why not? It brought back memories of growing up in Atlanta and getting into trouble. It reminded him of why he'd never made it to medical school like his cliché Asian parents had wanted, why he'd ended up a pizza delivery boy.

The group relied on Glenn as a tactician and provider, but they'd never asked him much about the before life. He didn't mind: there really wasn't much to tell.

He'd gotten in quickly, closing the door quietly behind him, armed with nothing but a nearly empty backpack and his trusted baseball bat.

Just because the store seemed untouched didn't mean it was clean of Walkers. For all he knew there was an unsecure back door that led out into the alley.

He picked his way through the narrow store silently, eyes running over the untouched racks of lacey bras, panties, and slutty uniforms. When he reached the edible panties and ice cream shop assortment of lube sitting on plastic shelves, Glenn couldn't help but blush.

He'd had a total of two girlfriends in his whole life, one of which he'd never gotten a chance to sleep with because, well, she'd turned into a zombie, and Glenn was adventurous but not that adventurous. No thank you.

So he'd bashed her brains in with her little brother's bat instead.

He tried not to think about that one time in high school where he'd drunkenly made out with one of his best friends. Joey was dead too, or if he wasn't, he was struggling to survive out there somewhere.

Or maybe fucking his brains out. Glenn kinda wished he could, too. He hadn't gotten laid since that one-day mistake with Maggie at the pharmacy, and that had been over so quickly he'd been embarrassed for days. She hadn't seemed to mind, though, so he'd quickly forgotten about it.

But Maggie wasn't taking the hint. She was badgering him every second he was anywhere near the farm house, trying to get all touchy-feely with him, like they were soul mates just because they were about the same age.

He'd wanted to tell her that she wasn't his only option, but had decided not to, just because, well, it WAS a bit rude, but for her to just assume they were going to play house-with-a-white-picket-fence just because of some hormonal rutting at the end of the world…

"The Coke-flavored one is the best."

Glenn had nearly jumped out of his skin, his bat swinging and hitting one of the shelves. It clattered apart noisily with plastic tubes of lube falling to the tiled ground with a bang. The loud noise made Glenn flinch then go still, his eyes wide as he focused in on grey eyes rimmed in black kohl.

He raised his bat, immediately on the defensive.

If there was anything the apocalypse had taught him over these crazy months it was that surviving humans were a lot scarier than flesh-eating zombies.

Glenn continued to stare at the stranger, his muscles tense and ready for an attack, his brain already supplying him with the quickest and cleanest escape route. He wasn't too far from the front door, but leaving an unpredictable human to his back…he didn't like that disadvantage at all.

So Glenn inspected the stranger, hoping his face wasn't showing too much surprise considering he couldn't have been much older than him. Glenn didn't like to judge but the boy looked like a Black Veil Brides groupie with his black skinny jeans, black v-neck tee, all black Converse, and black hair. Oh, look at that: even a black lip ring and nose stud. Black and grey tattoos spread out on his forearms and Glenn could see words peaking out on his chest but it was obscured by the tee. His black hair was just past his shoulders, his bangs pushed back off his face to reveal storm gray eyes and a smirk.

"Nice bat," the stranger said, using his arms to lift himself onto the cash register counter to sit and stare at Glenn. At least he wasn't one of those emaciated, underfed punks, "Lost mine a few weeks ago when I got ambushed in a mall. Found a machete in a Home Depot though. Got really lucky. Want some Skittles?"

Glenn refused to relax even as the punk boy pulled out a package of Skittles from a small wire basket on the counter and opened it with black fingernails. He noticed the rack of nail polish on the side of the counter. To each their own, he supposed. Glenn was sure if he got bored enough –

But back to the candy.

His mouth watered. Candy had always been a secret vice, something to hunt for when scouting in the city.

He'd never shared with the group, except the few pieces he'd slipped to Carl and Sophia back in the early days before she'd gone and got herself killed.

Glenn watched the punk put some Skittles in his mouth, chewing slowly.

"Dude, you need to relax. It's just me. Unless you think I can assassinate you with some Skittles, I'm harmless."

"Yeah, well, excuse the hell out of me if I don't trust you," Glenn shot back.

The kid smirked, "You're the first living thing I've talked to in months: it's just a bonus that you're cute and careful."

Glenn felt his face flush. He'd never been told he was cute before: not even by a girl.

"What's your name?" Glenn said, hoping his voice sounded hard and badass: he was the one with the bat, after all, "Where you from?"

"Name's Jude. Scavenged my way up here from Tampa, Florida. You'd be surprised how far you can get on your own with a commandeered golf cart and some random dumb luck."

Glenn lowered his bat slightly and held in a smile: he didn't want to admit it, but he felt like he could trust this kid, like in an alternate universe, they might've skipped a college calculus class and smoked weed together on the common lawn.

Glenn watched Jude pull a cigarette case out of his front pocket. He clicked it open, revealing four tight blunts, "So, K-Pop, wanna hit the peace pipe with me? This is the last of my stash. It really will be the end of the world."

"My name's Glenn," Glenn shot back, but hoped it wasn't too hard edged that he wouldn't get a chance to hit one of those blunts. It was something so simple from his old life that he missed, "but kudos for guessing Korean. Daryl calls me Chinaman and it drives me insane."

"Who's Daryl?"

Glenn cursed his rampant mouth. _Good job, Glenn. Someone dangles weed in front of you and you divulge group secrets. _

Jude shrugged, "I don't blame you for not trusting me: kinda comes with the territory of being strangers in a post-apocalyptic world overrun by Robs."

"Robs?"

He laughed. That laugh went straight to Glenn's dick. Strange.

"It's what I call the zombies. You know, like Rob Zombie? I dunno. I thought it was funny and I didn't know what else to call them."

"Walkers."

"To each their own. Now get over here so I can light this bitch up."

* * *

About an hour later, Glenn was full-out, aching belly laughing in the back storeroom of the sex shop.

He hadn't laughed like this in years, much less laughed like this since Armageddon started.

Jude had been hunkered down here for nearly a month, so he'd converted the space to be a bit more homey with sleeping bags, sheets, and pillows he'd commandeered from the furniture store on the other side of the plaza. There were an assortment of books and tattered music magazines, even a pile of Sudoku and word game books and a solved keychain Rubik's cube. Jude also had three cartons of Marlboro Reds and two unopened bottles of Jack Daniels, a freaking gold mine in Glenn's opinion considering all Jude had taken with him when he'd abandoned his apartment in Tampa was a Jansport backpack stuffed with his favorite pair of jeans, some socks, a black-and-white band t-shirt, a handful of sacred cds, an insane amount of weed, and a cd player that had run out of battery over a month ago.

The rest, the books, the puzzles, and markers had been his only form of entertainment since he'd hunkered down here. It was nice to have a bookshop in the plaza according to Jude: comic books and novels were littered across the floor like it was his bedroom.

One of the walls of the storeroom was covered in writing and drawings. Glenn was really impressed: the kid could draw, that was for damn sure. One part of the mural looked like a comic book of zombies being decapitated and burned, but the rest of the wall digressed into random song lyrics and diary-like thoughts and a tallied calendar.

Glenn took another hit off the nearly finished blunt, rolling it between his fingers as he studied the detail in the human forms drawn on the walls.

"That's crazy good," Glenn said, nodding his head towards the decorated wall, "You're like, really talented."

"Thanks, but it's a pretty useless talent for a zombie apocalypse," Jude retorted with a sigh, "but it passes the time."

Glenn nodded sagely, thinking about all the random activities he found himself doing in the hours when they weren't hunting down food or looking for a safe place to rest. Actually, being at the farm had made the group pretty docile.

Well, almost everyone. Daryl had kept himself busy searching for Sophia, but now that all the Walkers in the barn were dead, he'd taken off hunting almost every day, sometimes not coming back for a week.

Just drag himself back into camp, covered in mud and animal blood, a string of squirrels and maybe a deer, his eyes all forest feral...

"You play the guitar?" Glenn found himself asking. He had to get his mind off a certain sexy redneck: that kind of thinking was a dangerous road.

Jude nodded and lifted an eyebrow, "Yeah. Random question much?"

"I was just thinking about my guitar back at camp. I can't play it," Glenn said, passing the roach back to Jude.

"It'd be cool to play again. Haven't played since high school," Jude said, blowing smoke out of his nostrils. Glenn had always thought that was sexy for some reason, "too bad I didn't stumble on a music store, but a sex shop seemed pretty damn safe."

"It's pretty genius," Glenn admitted, laughing as he kicked a box full of glittery dildos that was by his outstretched foot.

Jude shrugged, "I just tried to think of the least-looted places possible. I slept in a liquor store for two weeks in Tennessee: that was probably the best place I've found so far besides this place. At least the liquor store had snacks and Gatorade and water: this place? Not so much, although now I have a lifetime supply of eyeliner."

"That's why all the other stores in this plaza were a bust," Glenn nodded, understanding how absolutely everything edible down to the chewing gum had been gone in the other stores, "How are you on water?"

Jude held up a half-empty bottle of Daniels, "This is it, G-man. Been almost three days with no water."

"Idiot. Stop drinking that then: you'll get even more dehydrated."

Jude shrugged. His shrugs were becoming infuriating, "I've survived this long. I'll move on in the morning. Was thinking of hotwiring that beat-up Mustang out there and there was a sign a ways back that said Atlanta's only another seventy miles."

Glenn touched Jude's shoulder, "No! You can't go there. It's totally infested. We barely got out of there."

Jude lifted an eyebrow, "We? So you're not alone?"

Glenn shook his head, taking a sip of Daniels himself, "Yeah, we're kinda small, but we've made it this far as a unit, so…I mean, there are some useless members, but it's not like we can just leave them to die out on their own…"

"So how long were you supposed to be gone? Won't they be worrying about you?"

Glenn snorted, "If Daryl can disappear on hunting trips for days on end, then I can go scavenge for a week. No big deal. I mean, it's actually nice: sometimes you need space. Like, it sucks not having any _privacy_. Like, I always have to worry about the kids or Rick or Carol or somebody coming into my tent when I'm trying to get off."

Jude laughed, "Dude, that sucks."

"I know, right? It's like, it's something we have to do, you know? It's not like there's many partners to choose from anymore."

Jude nodded and lit a cigarette, "You think you got it bad with partners? Try going into a zombie apocalypse gay. And I mean gay-gay, not we-might-not-be-alive-tomorrow-experimental gay."

Glenn rubbed his face, "Man, I'm sorry."

"It is what it is, although I was hoping you'd be."

Glenn laughed, pointing at himself, "Me?"

"Yeah, you. You're smart, funny, an obvious survivor. Plus, you're a hot Asian: never been with an Asian before. Was hoping to check that off my bucket list before I get eaten."

The honesty of the statement through Glenn off and for some reason it made him start thinking about Joey and their drunken make-out session years ago.

_Well, he was pretty drunk now…_

But no. No, that was a whole other level of recklessness he couldn't afford right now. No matter how cool or chill this Jude kid was it didn't mean he was safe with him.

But somehow his mouth still decided to blurt, "My first kiss was with a dude named Joey Gavin, but I've never had sex with a dude before."

Jude chuckled, stubbing out his cigarette on the Rubik's cube, "Glenn Whatever Your Last Name Is, are you telling me you're bi?"

"What? No, I dunno, I'm just saying – you know what? I don't even know. I'm pretty high right now, and that liquor –"

Jude leaned over and placed his hand over Glenn's crotch, making his leg jolt. Jude rubbed slightly. There was no hiding an erection and if Glenn wasn't interested, wouldn't he be limp as a soggy Ramen noodle? It wasn't even like he could blame it on testosterone and adrenaline: he'd only killed one Walker today and it had been in the early morning crossing from the highway.

"Dude, you want me to suck it?"

Glenn's throat went dry as his eyes went wide, "What?"

"You heard me, man. You don't have to reciprocate. Besides, I'm really good at it," Jude said, smiling as he stuck out his tongue to show off two silver studs, "and I'm tired of sucking on dildos."

Glenn squirmed as he felt himself get hot. Jesus, he'd always wondered about tongue piercings feeling good but he'd only been sucked off three times in his entire life and those girls had been kind of prissy, "Are you serious right now?"

Jude dropped Glenn's zipper without breaking eye contact. Glenn tried not to think about how hot that stupid simple action was, "Serious as a heart attack."

Well, it was the end of the world, and there were no witnesses, and it wasn't like Jude expected anything out of him. They'd probably never even see each other again.

And Glenn was already half hard, and honestly, what dude turned down a free blowjob?

So Glenn finally nodded once and Jude smirked, getting on his knees and spreading Glenn's thighs more for better access. He pulled Glenn's dick out through his boxers, squeezing it and stroking it to full hardness. Glenn put a fist to his mouth, hoping he wasn't squealing like a fornicating pig.

"Go ahead and scream: haven't seen a Rob in almost a week," Jude said before dipping his head down and spreading his lips around Glenn's stiff cock.

"Holy mother of – shit, that's amazing," Glenn said, throwing his head back, his fingers immediately tangling in Jude's hair. Glenn could feel the studs running along the underside of his cock and it was sending tremors through him almost instantly. He bucked his hips, but Jude didn't seem to mind, pulling off only long enough to lick around the head once and suck him back in, taking him to the back of his throat.

Glenn lost it, yelling to God in Korean as he came.

Jude swallowed, his throat muscles constricting once, twice, before he released Glenn's dick with a pop to sit up and smirk.

Glenn could feel how red his face was as he averted his eyes, "Um, I've never – shit, that's never happened before."

That'd been like, what, a minute and a half tops?

Jude just smiled, "It's cool. You must be pent-up. Nobody in your camp good?"

"Wouldn't know. I wouldn't sleep with any of them. That'd – that'd just be weird."

Glenn winced as a mental image of Daryl Dixon all hot and sweaty coming out of the woods covered in mud and dirt and leaves in his hair…

"You're starting to get hard again."

"Oh."

"I can help with that."

Glenn slammed his head back into the wall as Jude gripped him hard and groaned, "Dude, don't rip it off!"

Jude laughed, "Sorry, it just feels good. It's been months, man. I've had a boner since you walked in here."

Glenn blinked several times, trying not to think about the heat and blood in his belly, "Well, um, I could, you know, like, try, or something."

Jude's smile in combination with his messy hair and eyes had Glenn closing his eyes again. No way was he going to cum from staring at a hot dude.

Just, like, no.

"So what are you offering, exactly?" Jude said, his thumb hooking on the tip of Glenn's cock and making him suck in a breath.

"I…dunno…what. Wait, what?" Glenn said, trying to refocus, but the attention being paid to his naughty bits was just _so freaking_ distracting.

"I'd love to fuck you, or you could fuck me."

Glenn groaned as Jude's wrist started pumping him at an alarmingly fast rate, his balls beginning to tighten, "Ah, wait Jude-"

Jude stopped, his fingers tightening at the base of his cock, making him almost cry.

Jude leaned into him, nipping his earlobe, an erogenous zone that Glenn hadn't even known existed, "I'd let you fuck me. I'd even let you cum inside."

Glenn was panting at this point, his dick absolutely pounding, but this was scary and different and he wouldn't admit how much he liked the sound of what this stranger was saying.

"I'd be tighter than any girl you've ever fucked," he continued, his voice a low purr.

Jude licked Glenn's bottom lip, making Glenn open his mouth wide, his breathing getting wheezy from the harsh flicks of Jude's wrist.

Jude slipped his tongue in and that was all it took. Glenn moaned into Jude's mouth as he came, Jude sighing in satisfaction.

It took Glenn almost five minutes to realize how sticky his crotch felt.

Jude was zipping up his own pants, offering Glenn a lopsided smirk and a pillowcase to wipe himself down, the extra mess now making way more sense, "Sorry, man. Couldn't help myself."

* * *

"I'm so sick of eating squirrel."

Andrea sat on a log, staring at a plate with a few scraps of greasy squirrel meat and a tiny portion of canned beans. Most of the group had spread out but Lori sat close to her on a log, her only company for the time being.

"Are you an idiot? If Daryl hears you…"

"Too fuckin' late."

Andrea and Lori whipped their heads to the side to stare at the stoic redneck, his classic 'don't fuck with me' face plastered on for the world to see, his crossbow hefted onto his shoulder.

"She didn't mean it, Daryl," Lori said, using her soothing, patronizing tone, "We never thank you enough for all the meat you provide the group."

"No ya don't, but'cha don't gotta worry 'bout that no more, do ya?" Daryl said, spitting on the ground and walking away, "Ungrateful bitches."

Lori sighed and stared hard at the flabbergasted Andrea, "I hope he still offers meat to the others."

"I thought with Merle gone he'd loosen up a bit," Andrea said, shrugging her shoulders as she took a bite of beans, "but I'm serious: I don't think I could eat another squirrel. I'll steal one of Hershel's chickens if I have to."

Lori stared off towards the retreating form of Daryl. Of course he was heading for the forest. She was beginning to wonder if the man was even human: he seemed more forest monster than man.

"Give him a break. We're all stressed and trying to deal."

Andrea snorted, "Daryl doesn't get stressed, he gets violent."

"That was only once, and he was upset about Merle. He hasn't harmed a hair on anybody's head that isn't a Walker."

"He looks at me like I'm target practice."

"Well maybe you shouldn't have shot him."

"I thought he was a Walker!"

Instead of arguing with the stubborn blonde, she simply sighed and said, "You gonna finish that?"

* * *

Daryl crashed through the forest, not giving a damn that anything worth shooting at was now alert to his hunter presence. Good thing his stomach was full and he'd smoked some extra squirrel meat for himself for tomorrow or maybe he'd be treading a little more softly.

Fuck Andrea. Fuck Lori. Fuck all the useless bitches that Daryl had been having to deal with since this whole mess started.

He hadn't asked for the end of the world and he sure as hell hadn't asked to be burdened with badgering females who couldn't provide for themselves even if a Thanksgiving dinner walked up to 'em and bit 'em on the ass.

They all would'a starved to death months ago if it hadn't been for him and Merle. Yeah, the blonde bitches could fish, but so what? Wouldn't have been enough to keep them alive.

If it wasn't for the Chinaman's scouting and scavenging skills, they definitely would've never made it as far as they had, Daryl included. Even he couldn't live on meat alone.

It stopped Daryl with a jolt, the thought just now crossing his mind.

Besides himself, Glenn was the main provider and contributor to the group.

The old man, Dale or whatever, knew a bit about cars, but other then that, he acted like some kind of fucking moral compass. Daryl didn't really have beef with the old man, but his self-righteousness got annoying sometimes. And the nigger was quiet and made himself useful, but Daryl still wouldn't forgive him for dropping that motherfucking key. The black man stayed the hell away from Daryl at all costs, so he didn't think about him too much. And sure, that Shane ass hole and Rick Sherriff were some much-needed muscle, but they were too caught up in their female drama to think straight most of the time. Jesus, Daryl was so fucking sick of the constant displays of male dominance between the two he was more than tempted to put arrows through both their heads.

In his opinion, they should just fight it out or fuck it out.

"Fuckin' idiots," Daryl mumbled, continuing to crash through the forest.

Honestly. Maybe what Daryl needed more than for the females to drop dead was to get laid.

He hadn't been laid since the end of the world began, but Jesus Mary and Joseph, just the thought of touching one of the women he'd been forced to camp with for these past few months gave him hives.

And if Carol didn't stop giving him big mama doe eyes, he was gonna throw up.

Yeah, he'd helped look for Sophia. It'd been the right thing to do, the only thing to do, really, when your only other choice is to be cooped up on a farm where you're not even wanted. The old man had made that clear the day they'd showed up, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed thinking they'd finally have somewhere they could be safe.

Fuckin' idiots.

It didn't take a zombie apocalypse to figure out that safety was always temporary.

Daryl spit into the underbrush as he continued to cleave a trail, not really caring where he was going. His natural instinct was to scout the surrounding foliage and maybe try and hunt whatever small critter had crashed through in trying to get away from his loud footfalls, but he was still too pissed to really go through with it.

He stopped again, trying to calm himself. Dixons were bad at that: staying calm. Daryl was simple, way more simple than Merle, but even he couldn't avoid the Dixon temper.

He didn't hide his emotions: he just let them loose when they struck, which, so far, had kept him alive. His instincts were all he needed, but apparently right now he needed something ancient in his blood to calm the fuck down, and the first thing he thought of was sex.

He hadn't even touched himself in weeks. Usually a good hunt was better than an orgasm anyway. Usually.

But now he was thinking about skin, something to rut against, something to get into, and again he almost gagged thinking about any of the girls back at camp.

He wouldn't fuck Lori if she were the last pussy on earth, not with all her condescending holier-than-thou-mother-of-all self-righteousness and constant soap opera drama. Andrea? He'd sooner shoot her in the skull than touch her, and her little sister was dead, so no thank you.

And Carol. Jesus, help a lady look for her kid and suddenly he was supposed to play step daddy? She teased him, tried to get close to him, but he'd continue to shove her away. She was too old for him and he wasn't attracted to her at all, especially with all the crying. Daryl barely tolerated women, but emotional women were even worse.

So that left the farm girls, and Daryl barely ever saw them much less had an inclination to fuck them. Not that he would: he was pretty sure the blonde one was Carl's age and if Daryl had any gut instincts at all, the Maggie girl was after Chinaman's dick.

Some people were so blind. They'd at least fucked once, maybe twice. Daryl was a natural observer so maybe he was just good at deduction, but seriously the members of the group could be so fucking retarded sometimes.

Daryl shook his head: Rick had just figured out the whole Lori and Shane thing? Christ. Even the Walkers weren't that fucking dense.

And he was pretty sure Lori was pregnant. Call it his animal instincts, but he'd bet his left nut that she had Shane's bun in the oven.

Daryl ran a hand over his sweaty face, deciding heading for the river for a nice bath was the best course of action. If he couldn't fuck, he needed to relax, and soaking in some cold water sounded pretty damn good to his heated and smelly skin.

He used the setting sun as his compass and eventually came to the rocky riverbank, scanning the area carefully with his bow several times before he was convinced he was in relative safety.

Even he, Daryl Dixon, couldn't be dirty one hundred percent of the time. He'd need to drop his pants sooner or later.

So he disrobed quickly, pulling off jeans so filthy he knew he'd need to wash them in the river and walk back in squishy wet denim.

His balls were aching already.

Then a sleeveless flannel shirt. That was it, then he was wading into the river, naked as the day he was born.

Daryl had always been a minimalist with his clothing. The apocalypse hadn't changed that.

He dunked his head under quickly, reemerging to scrub at his chest and arms. The water was cold, colder then it had been a week before. Winter was coming.

He couldn't forget that. There were plenty of woods to hunt, but he had maybe six weeks to hunt and prep smoked meat before his major food sources were hunkered down for the winter months. Game would get scarce and eventually be nonexistent.

Didn't help that he had so many other people mooching off his supply. He didn't much mind: he'd had nothing better to do in the beginning and feeding them had kept them from killing Merle.

Not that any of them could probably kill Merle. The man was a tank. A strung-out, bipolar, sadistic tank, but a tank nonetheless. All Dixons were.

They were survivors, so that's what Daryl would do until he saw his brother again, the rest of the group be damned.

To be honest, he didn't know why he stuck with these hopeless idiots. When he boiled it down, there really was no reason to stay other then for the sake of psychological community. Whether he liked it or not, human beings were social creatures. He needed some kind of social interaction, at least some of the time.

Like the Chinaman. He was pretty damn funny when he was making a fool of himself, or telling some long, exaggerated story about horrific pizza delivery scenarios.

Daryl dunked his head again before going back to shore to grab his jeans and scrub them with his hands in the water.

The Chinaman wasn't so bad. He kept to himself, too, although he was always friendly. Never a bad word about anybody, which Daryl appreciated. Gossip was something he had never understood and didn't much tolerate, but as far as he knew, Glenn was a horrible liar and a genuinely honest and good guy.

And Dale was alright: he was just an old man trying to be helpful. And Rick kept people from unleashing too much stupid, but other then that, Daryl honestly couldn't stand anybody else.

It made Daryl wonder why him and the Chinaman didn't team up for scavenges. After all, with Daryl at Glenn's back, they'd be pretty much unstoppable. A small, efficient unit like that would be way more successful then the half-assed runs the chink made with that farmer's daughter.

Or maybe he was just jealous.

"The fuck?" Daryl growled to himself, getting out of the water and slipping into his clean-as-they-were-going-to-get jeans. Why'd he give one shit about who Glenn spent his time with? If he wanted to fuck, let him fuck. If he wanted to convince himself that love existed in the world, then Daryl wasn't gonna preach to him any different.

Daryl doubted the kid was stupid enough to believe in love in this new hellhole called a world, but if he needed that physical flicker of hope, so be it.

Daryl pulled his shirt on over his head and picked up his crossbow, heading back in the direction of camp when he heard some heavy twigs snapping.

He instantly ducked and crouched, his eyes scanning the ground around him. The light was fading quickly now: maybe ten minutes 'til he wouldn't be able to see a hand in front of his face without the scope light he kept mounted on his cross bow, but that was back in his tent, and he didn't particularly feel like drawing any unnecessary attention to himself at the moment.

He relaxed slightly when he heard a voice.

Correction. _Voices._

_The fuck?_ He didn't recognize one of them, but the other was the Asian, and was he…_laughing?_

Daryl anchored his crossbow, seeing the Korean emerge less than two hundred yards away, a slightly taller dark-haired stranger trailing right behind him. He sported all black, Johnny Cash style. Daryl could dig that, but he was more than confused and his gut reaction was to shoot somebody that had the potential to destroy their hard-earned camp.

Daryl stepped to the side, crouched slightly, "You pickin up strays now, Chinaman?"

Glenn looked like he'd been about to scream, a hand over his heart as he took in Daryl's wet/clean appearance, "Holy crap, Daryl, what the hell?"

Daryl still kept his crossbow trained on the stranger, surprised that the kid's facial expression was borderline-smirk.

Daryl bristled, "Who the fuck're you?"

"This is Jude. I found him in town. He's been on his own for months –"

"So he says," Daryl grunted, his trigger finger itching, "Thought you Asians was supposed to be smart."

"So this is Daryl," the punk kid annunciated, smiling, "You had me thinking he was some kind of ogre, Glenn. Naughty."

Daryl squinted his eyes at the stranger, not quite sure how to take the words.

"Why the fuck would you bring him here?"

"He has nowhere else to go," Glenn whined, "and he's all the way from Florida; he's the only other survivor we've met that's from out of state. He's traveled way more ground then we have: he's probably the best information network we've got right now."

Despite himself, Daryl was intrigued. So far Daryl had been convinced every state, every city, had to fight for themselves. To say that this pale punk had managed to cross so much land on his own during a zombie apocalypse with no government spoke volumes for his survival skills.

Maybe the kid was as good a scavenger as Glenn, a definite asset.

But that didn't mean he could trust the kid. Honestly he didn't know what had possessed Glenn to trust him so readily either: he could be lying. He could have a gang of other survivors just waiting for an opportunity to spring on another group's supplies.

Daryl looked the kid in the eyes: they were intelligent eyes, maybe even dangerous eyes.

And he was holding a bloody machete.

"Gimme one reason why I shouldn't put an arrow through this kid's skull, Chinaman. You're a fucking idiot for bringing him back this far."

Daryl was about to say something else when the Jude kid said, "I've got liquor and cigarettes. You interested?"

Fuck yes he was interested. He hadn't had a smoke since the world went to hell and hadn't had a drink since the disaster at the CDC.

Daryl lowered his crossbow, staring at the boy like he was sizing him up.

What could it hurt? 'Sides, he could always kill him in the morning.

"S'pose there's room for one more."

* * *

_**/End Part 1.**_

_**Next time:**_

_Daryl tried to ignore the fierce erection in his jeans at seeing Jude covered in zombie sludge and blood, machete in one hand while his other held a cigarette._

_"Ya got some smooth moves for a skinny dude."_

_Jude just grinned, tonguing his lip ring as he held out his half-finished cigarette towards Daryl, "You got no idea, Hawk Eye."_

_He couldn't look away. Oh shit. _

_So that's what Merle meant by eye fuckin'._


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Had myself a little Reedus marathon to get back into this story. Dark Harbor anyone? -TPP**

* * *

**Smokes and Skittles**

**Part 2.**

_"I make the road. I draw the map._

_Nothing just happens to me…I'm the one happening." –Denis Johnson_

* * *

Glenn hadn't been surprised to run into Daryl in the forest, but he sure as hell wasn't ready to face the rest of the camp.

For one, he'd never brought back a survivor.

And two, he was pretty sure Shane was going to put up a fight with his crazy eyes. Glenn was banking on Rick being the usual man of reason, and he knew Dale would probably be the first to hug Jude and welcome him into the family like he was a new blushing bride.

As far as the women went, well, Glenn didn't really give a damn. Andrea would probably PMS and Lori might hug Carl to her side a little tighter until she was sure, but Glenn knew that Jude had the power to win the camp over.

The unknowable variables, as far as Glenn had been concerned, were Shane and Daryl.

Jude had taken care of that little redneck snare quite easily, actually. Glenn had forgotten about the bottle of booze and the cigarettes. The rest of his pack had been stuffed with skinny jeans, two t-shirts, and a well-used pack of playing cards.

And the machete in hand, that was about it. Glenn's own pack held the slim pickings he'd found before running into Jude, but the trip hadn't been a total waste.

He didn't care how much they had to rough it during a zombie Apocalypse. He didn't care if he WAS a dude, he'd use toilet paper until the day he fucking died, and that was that.

"You're laggin', Chinaman," Daryl said, stopping in his tracks, half a cigarette dangling from his lips. Glenn wasn't a nicotine man, but shit, he could appreciate the picture it painted right now.

Jude flicked his own finished fag and stomped over it, a smirk on his face, "Don't want Smokey coming after me now."

Glenn's eyes went wide, "You think there's bears out here?"

Just great. Flesh-eating zombies and now Glenn would have to think about bears.

Maybe even zombie bears.

"Ain't unheard of but I would'a seen some signs. If only, kid: bear's good eating," Daryl said almost wistfully, taking another drag from Jude's peace present, "the grease sticks to your ribs for days."

"Don't talk about food. I'm starving," Jude interjected, running a hand over his flat stomach.

"S'get'ya something 'ta eat, then," Daryl mumbled, stomping out his own finished cancer stick and continuing in the general direction of camp.

"I think it'll be best to let me do the talking," Glenn said, pulling up the rear of their hike, Jude between the other two, a comfortable sandwich that none were really conscious of, "We have a few hotheads and it'll probably lead to a fight-"

"The old man might not like it either," Daryl threw in, making Glenn feel even more intimidated by the unknowable situation.

"I didn't even think about Hershel."

"It's his land. We'll have 'ta see."

Jude stopped in his tracks, making Glenn bump into his back.

"I didn't think about the situation too hard coming out here. Maybe I should stay here until you talk to them," Jude offered, his face serious, "I mean, technically leaving me out here, I don't know your camp position. Might make it a little easier for your people to trust me."

"What, leave 'ya fer Walker bait?" Daryl said with scrunched eyebrows. Daryl could fend for himself, everybody knew that, but most of the time he had some kind of backup during nighttime watches.

"Don't be stupid, we're not leaving you out here by yourself," Glenn reassured, touching his shoulder.

"I'll climb that tree and chill until you come back," Jude said nodding his head at the big oak a few feet away from the stopped party, "If you don't come back by daybreak, I'll know your group's decision. Stupid simple."

Glenn felt like he'd just swallowed a brick. It was weird hearing Jude sound so matter of fact: no doubt he wasn't a stupid guy, but right now it was very professional, not a single smirk or smile to show that he was screwing around.

He was dead serious. It was kind of sexy.

Daryl nodded his head once, "The kid's makin' sense. The fuckin' cops are gonna make this a trial, Chinaman."

It made too much sense, but another logical side of Glenn thought that actually SEEING Jude might do the group good: he was young, pretty gangly-looking. Strong guys like Shane and T-Dog would underestimate him, call him skin and bones. Even the women might not be intimidated by him. If Merle were there, he'd probably get called a girl because of his longer hair.

Then again, having Glenn tell the story without the threat of giving up their position would probably win more brownie points more quickly than having puppy dog eyes from a wanderer.

"Okay. Okay, let's go, then," Glenn reasoned, nodding his head once and headed in the direction of camp, "We'll be back as soon as we can, okay?"

Jude smiled. Glenn felt like he'd just swallowed another brick, "See ya, Glenn."

…

Daryl had thought about staying behind with the new kid as insurance, but had thought better of it at the last second and followed Glenn's hurried pace back in the direction of camp.

It took them about twenty minutes before they saw the glow of a campfire, shapes stirring, readying food.

"Guys!" Glenn hollered, jogging ahead and waving a hand.

Everybody looked up, bodies tense, faces questioning. Probably hadn't been the best way of breaking in the welcome wagon, but Daryl knew the Korean was a good talker.

"Something wrong, Glenn?" Rick asked, hand already going for his holster.

"I found a survivor."

So much for subtlety.

"What?" Shane jumped in, getting up from his place on a log, "Where is he? Did he attack you?"

"No, nothing like that," Glenn continued, holding up his hands, "his name's Jude. He's probably younger than me and totally alone. He's been holed up in a store in that plaza I've been scouting lately. I…I brought him back."

Daryl's muscles tensed as he watched Shane's reaction, his trigger finger itching. The man was a hot head, a total lunatic that the others trusted almost blindly, but Daryl knew a predator when he saw one.

"Are you crazy? Are you out of your goddamn mind?" Shane spat.

"You took him back here? To camp? To this farm?" Rick threw in, his voice much more controlled.

"Where is he? Is he injured?" Dale said, setting down his plate and looking at Glenn and Daryl like they were doctors.

Good 'ol Dale.

"He's a good mile and a half away," Daryl heard himself saying, "He's waitin' out there for us 'ta make a judgment call."

"Out there? In the woods?" Carol said, her mother voice in full swing, "By himself?"

The way she said it made Daryl think about Sophia, about getting bit.

It didn't sit well with him. He didn't want to think about Jude fending out there by himself.

What if they went back and he was turned?

"I trust him," Glenn announced, dropping his pack off his shoulders and pulling out a bottle of Aspirin and a tube of Neosporin, "He gave these to me. He didn't beg me to come here, guys, I just…he doesn't belong out there alone. I WANTED him to come back here, to be safe with us."

"We don't know this kid from Adam and Eve," Shane seethed, running his hands over his recently-shaved head, "he could be playing us! What if he's got a group hunkered down out there somewhere just waiting to jump us for our resources? Our women?"

"He's not like that. He's a good guy," Glenn said, his expression getting defensive, almost angry.

Glenn decided throwing in the gay card might help, but decided against it. It wasn't his place, but the women would be safe, that was for damn sure.

"Right now, maybe," T-Dog mumbled from the fireside, "but for how long?"

"We're all strangers here," Dale defended, adjusting his Gilligan hat, "we were all strangers, scared of each other, but look at us now. We're a family, a unit. We should give the boy a chance."

"So what? We're gonna vote?" Andrea said, lifting an eyebrow, "What about Hershel's family? They might kick us out already as it is. Another mouth might tip us one too many."

"So what? Leave the kid out there to fend for himself? To die alone?" Dale said, looking at Andrea with that paternal concern he was so good at, "Someone Amy's age?"

"Younger. He was in college before the break out," Glenn continued to defend, hoping he was stacking a good defense for Jude, "an English major with a minor in art history. He's from Florida. He's made it this far all on his own. He's smart, resourceful: he's a scavenger, like me. We need survivors like him. He's the one who volunteered to stay in the woods: he knows you don't trust him, that he has to prove himself."

The campsite went quiet, the crackling fire and shuffling of feet the only disturbances.

Daryl let one corner of his mouth turn up: this battle was gonna be won.

"Vote?" Lori finally sighed, holding up her hand, "All in favor of giving this Jude a chance?"

It took a moment, especially with Shane's sick look, but Dale raised his hand immediately, followed by Carol.

Glenn's hand was up. Shane, T-Dog, and Andrea's stayed down.

Which left Daryl and Rick.

Daryl was surprised when Rick made eye contact with him, "First impression?"

Glenn looked a little lost, like he might fight Rick over Jude's integrity, but in the end he looked a bit defeated.

Logic said that he was biased. He'd spent too much time with him, softened up.

Daryl hadn't had time for that. The booze and cigarettes aside, he trusted his gut instincts with his life.

"He'd be useful," he finally grunted, "haven't seen him fight, but if he's covered that much ground on his own, we'd be stupid to turn him away."

Rick ran fingers through his own hair, his face grim. This new life had aged him quickly.

Daryl couldn't help how the group saw the leadership dynamic: honestly he didn't understand it, but he wasn't gonna let some kid starve to death out in the woods because the city folk were sketchy, "I'll watch him. He does something stupid, I'll shoot him myself."

Everybody looked at him, including Glenn. If Daryl's gut was right, it wouldn't come to that, but it seemed to be enough for T-Dog and Andrea because they nodded their heads. Shane's arms were crossed over his chest, his stance betraying his true feelings. He knew he was lost: the whole pack was almost against him now.

Rick looked at Lori, then at Shane, "Go get him. He must be hungry."

Glenn's smile was huge, "Great. You guys aren't going to regret this."

Shane rubbed at his nose, "We'll see."

* * *

"I knew Shane was going to be a pain in the ass, but Andrea? I wasn't expecting that non-vote."

Daryl listened to Glenn babble the whole way back through the woods. They'd stopped at Daryl's tent long enough for him to grab a flashlight to mount on his crossbow and the journey back through the woods was windy and quiet except for Glenn's rambling.

The kid was hyped, excited.

Daryl supposed it made sense: finally having someone around his own goddamn age instead of getting stuck with a kid who couldn't hold a gun yet and an old man with an RV.

No wonder Glenn liked to babble to Daryl so much. He probably felt they were closest in age, had some kind of brotherly dynamic going on that he couldn't get from Shane or T-Dog or Rick.

It was a little weird, but Daryl didn't mind Glenn's voice. It was kind of nice, actually. Daryl wasn't a huge talker, but he wasn't antisocial.

Unless he was around stupid people.

Daryl tensed as they neared the oak they'd left Jude by, his light falling over dark patches of blood before Glenn sucked in a breath beside him, the light falling on a decapitated woman Walker.

Daryl saw blood on the trunk of the tree, following the slight blood prints up to the thick boughs.

He saw the glowing cherry of a cigarette before anything else.

Jude grinned down at them, his bloody machete on his lap, "Hey, guys. 'Sup?"

…

Jude climbed down, Daryl keeping the flashlight on his descending form.

Daryl thought it highlighted his ass quite nicely. Fuckin' skinny jeans.

"You're like a monkey," Glenn smirked, watching Jude jump the rest of the way down, landing on the balls of his feet.

Jude shrugged, "Just lucky the fuckers can't climb. Surprised you guys are back so quickly."

"America might be fucked, but democracy ain't dead," Daryl offered, surprised he was talking so damn much. It's not like he wouldn't put an arrow through the kid's skull the second he looked like he might put the camp at risk.

But for now, that was one sick-looking machete.

And the kid could use it. From the looks of it, the decap had been pretty clean.

Daryl didn't want to admit it was a turn-on. Then again, survival had always been sexy to him, Apocalypse or no.

Glenn grabbed at the straps of Jude's backpack, tugging, "Come on, you have a camp to meet."

* * *

No surprise everyone was tense around the campfire when the three finally trudged into view, several of them relaxing when Jude smiled and offered a wave of his hand.

"Yo."

"Yo yourself," Rick said, stepping forward and offering his hand, "Rick Grimes. That there's my wife Lori, my son Carl…"

Glenn rolled his eyes at the stream of information, some of the group looking uncomfortable as they were introduced. It was a strange ritual they hadn't had to go through in some time.

"Good thing I'm horrible with names," Jude said with a grin when Rick was finally finished and the last person had nodded their head in acknowledgment, "but this is awesome. Glenn's the first living thing I've talked to in months. This is a bit of a shock."

At that Daryl knew Jude had already begun to worm his way into the group's hearts: being completely alone and young during one of the world's greatest catastrophes immediately evoked the mothering instinct in the women.

Carol was practically hugging him with her eyes and Lori looked less guarded. Andrea looked a bit thoughtful and even T-Dog's shoulders relaxed. It was a start.

"You hungry, son? Just cooked up some squirrel and beans," Dale offered, beginning to scoop up some of the leftovers.

"I'm starving," Jude conceded, going straight for the old man with a smile, "Appreciate it, uh…mind if I call ya Gramps?"

"Always wanted to be a grandpa," Dale said with a laugh, handing the plate over.

The group went back to eating, asking Jude simple questions about how he'd been surviving so far, which got him worked up into his more amazing stories of survival that usually ended in members of the group laughing their asses off.

"I'd just crossed into Georgia and the sun was going down, so I was desperate to find somewhere to crash," Jude licked at a finger covered in squirrel grease, holding Glenn's attention even more now, "and what's the first thing I come across in the sweet state of Georgia? A fuckin' Dairy Queen."

"Damn, what I wouldn't give for one of those shitty burgers," T-Dog murmured, earning some laughs.

Jude grinned at T-Dog, leaning forward more on his log perch, hands on his knees, "Only a few infected out front, broke one of the glass doors and head for the kitchen, right? Took out a Rob that had gotten stuck behind the cash register counter and that was about it. The place was pretty clean, so I head back for the storeroom, wondering if there's anything canned I can get my hands on."

"I open the door, and what's inside? Candy Land, man. Freaking CANDY LAND. Sprinkles, Reese's cups, M&M's, OREOS – all the shit they mix into those Blizzards. God, I ate until I puked."

Everybody laughed or smiled, thinking about the sweet sugary goodness. Glenn was probably the most jealous next to Carl who looked like he'd been denied going to Disney World.

"It was heaven. Locked myself up in the closet they must'a called an office and slept for three days, like I was in hibernation or something. Checked the breakers and stuff, but the power was totally out: no back-up generators. I used to work at Checkers, so I'd thought I'd get lucky, but no dice. Most fast food chains can afford back-up generators. Could'a had myself some waffle fries for breakfast. Still, it'd been a good find. I've got a mean sweet tooth."

Daryl saw Jude wink at Glenn, his face going red almost instantly.

Oh really?

Jude had already launched into another story at Andrea's prodding, but Daryl continued to study Glenn's fidgeting in the firelight.

So that's how the kid was gonna get his rocks off? It would make that mooning farmer's girl crazy with jealousy if she started getting ignored over a tattooed punk with a sweet tooth.

But Jude was a charmer. Made Daryl wonder if he'd work his way into her pants eventually with all that sweetness, but maybe not. Maybe the kid was as straight as a rainbow.

He'd find out, he suspected.

After all, Daryl had always been a damn good observer.

* * *

Daryl had just swallowed his last bit of squirrel when Glenn reappeared by the fireside, guitar in hand. He must've went back to his tent to get it.

Daryl didn't know what it was all about until he saw Glenn hand it to Jude, his face excited like a child on Christmas morning.

"Nice," Jude said, appreciatively running his hands over the acoustic, his fingers immediately going for the strings for a fresh tune, "It's been…forever."

"You play?"

Daryl snorted. God had certainly made sure Andrea'd been born a blonde.

"Yeah," Jude offered anyway, plucking away at the strings, just nonsensical notes as his fingers started to grip and get used to holding one again, "It's weird to hold something and not have the sudden urge to swing it."

"Play for us," Carl demanded, pretty excited that there would be something to break the monotony of another silent night. He was tired of stories.

Jude looked at him, "What'd you got in mind, little man?"

Lori had a small smile on her face as she stroked through Carl's hair as Carl thought.

"Um…I dunno. Something nice."

"Mm…gimme a minute," Jude murmured, tapping the knuckles of his right hand against the wood gently before he opened his eyes and smirked, "Yeah."

His fingers started out tentative, but the melody began to build, making several people smile. It was nice to hear music again. Any kind of music.

But Daryl hadn't expected the kid to start singing.

_"Yellow diamonds in the light_

_And we're standing side by side_

_As your shadow crosses mine_

_What it takes to come alive_

_It's the way I'm feeling I just can't deny_

_But I've gotta let it go…"_

Almost everybody was smiling by now, listening to his soft voice. It was eerie, his voice growing as he started strumming harder, faster, building the tempo:

_"We found love in a hopeless place_

_We found love in a hopeless place_

_We found love in a hopeless place_

_We found love in a hopeless place…"_

Jude had closed his eyes again, his foot tapping out a beat as some people started clapping along. Daryl didn't recognize the song at all, but Andrea, Lori, and Glenn were smiling and mouthing along to the words as Jude kept them going:

_"We found love in a hopeless place_

_We found love in a hopeless place_

_We found love in a hopeless place_

_We found love in a…hope…less…place."_

Jude stopped, opening his eyes and smiling.

Daryl noticed Glenn had this glazed look on his face. Jude had a groupie, that was for damn sure.

Not that Daryl wasn't impressed: he was, more than impressed. The kid didn't have the best voice in the world, but you could tell he felt the music.

That's what mattered. His hands still had some Walker blood on them: it was splattered across the front of his shirt, but not much. It was just weird seeing it when this moment seemed so normal, so camp-like.

A family reunion, maybe.

"That was beautiful," Lori finally said, kissing Carl on top of his head as she held him in her arms, Rick at her side, "Do you mind playing again?"

"Let's see," Jude tweaked a random beat as he looked up at the sky, thinking. He smirked and started up Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, getting a few laughs from the adults. Even Carl rolled his eyes.

Daryl continued to stay leaning against a sapling, crossbow still on his shoulder.

He wasn't going anywhere anytime soon.

* * *

"Been a long time since I've gone camping," Jude chuckled, flopping down on the pile of sleeping bags in Glenn's small tent.

Glenn swallowed nervously, ignoring where Jude's t-shirt had ridden up to expose his belly button studs.

"Are you sure it's cool to crash here? I can sleep outside," Jude said slowly, using his forearms to sit up more.

"You're not sleeping outside," Glenn said, moving his sleeping bag as far into the corner as he could. Not like it made much of a difference: the tent was small, easy to break down and carry at a moment's notice.

It wasn't like anybody else trusted Jude this first night, and honestly there wasn't anywhere else for him to go: Shane and T-Dog bunked together, Carol was in the RV with Andrea and Dale, Lori and Rick and Carl had the big tent, and Herschel's family hadn't even met Jude yet.

Not that they let any of them sleep in the house, so for now, Glenn would have a roommate.

Glenn felt like he got punched in the gut when Jude lifted his shirt over his head: the kid was deceptively fit, tattoos curving down the left side of his rib cage and Latin written across the top of his chest.

"G'nite, Glenn," Jude said, turning onto his side and closing his eyes.

"Yah. Night," Glenn mumbled, taking off his baseball cap and trying to ignore his hot groin.

This was gonna be torture.

* * *

"Goddammit," Daryl hissed, shooting a Walker clean through the forehead. There were half a dozen more along the riverbank, all of them hissing and intent on Daryl's flesh.

He'd gotten up at first light for some light hunting, even contemplated making some snares, but he'd always frowned upon that kind of hunting. It wasn't really hunting: it was lazy. If Merle had been there, he'd kick him seven ways to Sunday for pussying out.

Now here he was, barely two miles outside camp, getting swarmed by a mini horde. They looked absolutely ragged, three of them wearing hiking boots while the others were in farmer garb.

"Howdy, neighbors," he said humorlessly as he shot the pot-bellied farmer in the head. He dropped to the mud with a heavy sloshing sound.

He was dangerously low on arrows, so he took out his bowie knife, taking down a skinny woman in a flower print dress.

When they were all down, he collected his arrows, reminding himself that the next time Glenn went for a run he was going with to scavenge hunting stores. Hell, even private homes if it came down to it. He only had five arrows left for hunting, the rest having been used for Walker control.

He headed back towards camp, disappointed with the four rabbits strapped to his side.

He heard the commotion before he saw it, which always put Daryl on edge.

He tore through the trees, hearing Andrea's shrill voice and Shane's leader bark.

Holy shit.

It looked like a battlefield as he stepped out, crossbow trained on his shoulder. He saw the group using melee weapons on a dozen or so Walkers: Glenn with a bat, Shane with a crow bar, Rick with a shovel.

And Jude. Jude putting a machete through a bloated Walker's forehead, straight through like a fucking watermelon before he tore it out viciously and attacked another. Daryl was so caught up in watching the fierce look on the kid's face he was jostled by the sound of Carol's voice as she called to him.

Daryl shook his head slightly and aimed at a Walker close to Glenn, taking it out before re-notching another arrow.

Glenn looked confused for a second but then met his eyes, looking grateful as he headed for one of the last remaining Walkers. Jude met him in the middle, swinging his machete across the man's neck and Glenn went for its knees.

Fucking hell, why was he turned on by that picture?

_Like watching two hot girls wrestle in mud,_ his brain supplied.

Nah, not exactly, but at that moment, Daryl didn't know which he preferred.

The situation finally defused, Rick barked out orders to start dragging the bodies. Lori, Carl, and Dale came closer, asking everybody if they were alright. Carol and Andrea were hugging like it was the end of the world, which it was, but come on, seriously, it wasn't that big of a deal.

If anything, it was just annoying. This wasn't the first time a Walker had wandered into the open field, but never this many at a time. He knew it would have Rick and Shane on edge, bickering more than usual about the safety of their little found haven.

It was still safer than anywhere else they'd been, so Daryl knew the girls would fight tooth and nail to stay.

Daryl headed for his arrow, taking it out viciously as Glenn said something to Jude. Jude laughed and shoved Glenn in the shoulder. Daryl noticed Glenn's face was extra red, his eyes on Jude's bloody chest. He'd managed to get much dirtier than the others.

"You need a bath," Glenn said, bat slung over his shoulder.

"Why? The whole blood and gore look a turn-off?" Jude teased, wiggling a cigarette out of his pocket with his machete-less hand then digging back in the same pocket for a lighter. He tilted his head to light it, making his hair move back across his shoulder, exposing stretched earlobes and a silver bar through the top of his cartilage that looked pretty damn painful in Daryl's opinion.

"It's sexy for about ten seconds, then it's just gross," Glenn said, wiping at his own splattered neck.

"Dunno about that," Jude said, eyes roaming over Glenn's jean-and-white-t-shirt ensemble.

Daryl would've laughed at Glenn's obvious awkwardness if he wasn't feeling so awkward himself.

"Nice work," Rick called over to them, making Jude hold up his machete in a half-salute. Unsurprisingly, Shane looked even more annoyed now that the kid had proven he wasn't a complete waste of space. He knew that the Walker killings would warm the group up to him even more now.

"Alright, ya'all. You know the drill," Shane said, heading in the direction of the pick-up truck Herschel let them use for transporting, "Other side of the field, away from the grazing land."

People started to fall into their automatic duties, Glenn jogging off after Shane while Jude stood, unsure of his role now. Nobody had told him to do anything, so he wasn't sure if he was welcome or not.

Daryl tried to ignore the fierce erection in his jeans at seeing Jude covered in zombie sludge and blood, machete in one hand while his other held a cigarette.

And he heard himself saying, "Ya got some smooth moves for a skinny dude."

Jude just grinned, tonguing his lip ring as he held out his half-finished cigarette towards Daryl, "You got no idea, Hawk Eye."

He couldn't look away. Oh shit.

So that's what Merle meant by eye fuckin'.

He took the cigarette, their fingers brushing together.

Daryl puffed, trying to ground himself. Jude lifted the hem of his now-disgusting shirt and tried to wipe more blood from his face, exposing hard abdominals and…

Fuck me sideways, that two belly button piercings?

"Got 'em for my sixteenth birthday," Jude said knowingly, dropping his shirt and opening his mouth to wiggle his tongue before saying, "Seventeenth."

Daryl must've been flushed clean through to his toes. Goddammit he'd hooked up with a biker chick one time with one'a those.

And the way this Jude kid was staring at him, he wasn't stupid.

Daryl knew body language. He knew his instincts.

This kid was down to fuck.

Daryl didn't know why that didn't bother him too much, or why his stomach was getting all hot.

He didn't give a fuck about sex. Sex was sex, no matter what equipment you had to work with.

And he hadn't fucked in a long, long time.

And it wasn't like he'd never fucked a stranger, which this Jude kid still was. Then again, he'd fucked girls he'd barely known five minutes, never even learning their name.

In terms of Apocalypse bonds, knowing someone for twenty-four hours was a pretty solid relationship.

"What about eighteenth?" Daryl said gruffly.

Jude lifted his shirt all the way up to the top of his chest, showing his inked Latin words, "My first ink."

The kid could've just as easily said he got ink. Could've pushed his neckline down.

Nah. Too boring for Jude, and Daryl didn't mind.

He could feel how hot the back of his neck was as the kid dropped his shirt again, "Tops of my feet, nineteenth; calves were my twentieth and twenty first. Twenty-second my ribs, twenty-third my wrists. Guess I won't get any for my twenty-fourth," he said with a shrug.

Daryl groaned internally: there was a decade age difference between himself and this kid.

Then again, Glenn was the same age.

He didn't know why his brain was traveling down this dangerous road. The fact that he was even thinking of fucking a twenty-three year old male in their current living circumstances was a problem on it's own, but the fact that a picture of the Chinaman getting fucked stupid by this tattooed punk was enough to make his dick twitch.

"You got ink," Jude said. It was a statement.

Daryl nodded once: he had a few pieces he'd gotten done in his teens, but they weren't too exposed. He'd never wanted to be covered in them, but at the time they'd seemed like a good idea. He liked to think the two demons he had were some kind of a lucky charm in this apocalypse: they'd always been talismans against evil to him.

He remembered his Ma reciting Bible verses when he was little, before she started drinking and never leaving the house: _"Hate what is evil and love what is good."_

Ha. Then why the fuck had she loved his old man so much?

That man had been evil. Merle was a kitten compared to the ass hole that had called himself father.

But that was neither here nor there, not anymore. Not since Ma had died in the fire. Not since Pa had drunk himself to the grave, leaving him to build a new, quieter life since Merle had been locked up on drug charges at the time.

A demon on his right inner bicep, barely noticeable, would be totally hidden if he didn't like sleeveless flannel so damn much. Another winged one on his back and a calligraphic word over his heart was all the ink he claimed.

Jude's eyes traveled over him again, "Guess we should help them."

Daryl nodded, slinging his crossbow onto his back as the truck pulled up to the dead bodies.

Glenn hopped out of the back of the truck as T-Dog and anybody else strong-bodied started to hoist the unmoving flesh.

Glenn seemed to stop and stare at the two close men. Daryl hadn't even noticed they were standing that close together.

It made him nervous. He was never this unaware of his own body or surroundings.

Jude and Glenn struck up another conversation about getting cleaned up at the river after the bodies were burned.

Daryls' gut rolled again.

* * *

_...to be continued._

* * *

_A/N: In case you didn't know, those are Norman Reedus' actual tattoos. He has his own name, Norman, tattooed over his heart. I guess in case he forgets, the humble, funny, sexy ass hole. For the sake of the fic, I'll have to come up with something: I don't think Daryl would have a man's name tattooed on him. Besides Glenn, of course ;) _

_Onwards to the smut! -TPP_


End file.
